Oregon - beaches, bikes, blue skies

After two 8 (ish) hour days on the road, we pulled into Astoria - the northern tip of the Oregon coast. Our guidebook had some helpful suggestions about where to camp and we settled on a State Park just west of town. Fort Stevens turned out to be a beautiful campground with lots of trees, a beautiful trail system, a fresh water lake for swimming, boating and fishing and quick access to the beaches. After putting in some good miles on the road, we opted to stay for 2 nights and were tempted to stay for a third. 

Surfing with Two Wheels

We pulled in around dusk on Thursday, got set up quickly and then went to bed early, tired from a long day of travel. When we awoke the next morning, the sun was shining and we were eager to explore. We hopped on the bikes and rode with the dogs down the trail to the beach - when we crested the final hill and saw the sand and the ocean, we started laughing and cheering. It was like being a kid on Christmas morning. We spent the next few hours riding along the shore, watching the dogs play in the surf and explored an old ship wreck - the Peter Iredale - on the beach. Afterwards, we rode to the little freshwater lake to let the dogs rinse off and then utilized the park’s trail system for a fun single-track loop around the lake. Later in the day, we visited the town of Astoria and poked around the various antique shops. After supper back at the campground, we brought the truck down to the beach and enjoyed a glass of wine while we watched the sunset.

Typical Oregon Coast Views

On Saturday, we road our bikes back to the beach for some more playtime and then took down camp and headed a short ways south to Ecola State Park (another good recommendation from the guide book). We settled into the day use area for lunch and then hiked to Crescent Beach to check out the famed “Haystack Rocks”. The hike itself was beautiful, heavily canopied with cedar and hemlock trees, which provided some welcome shade. When we caught the view of Crescent beach below, I actually had tears in my eyes because it was so spectacular! Further to the south of Crescent Beach was the far more crowded Cannon Beach - I think the access to Cannon beach was a bit easier for most, and we were happy to enjoy having Crescent Beach mostly to ourselves. We did wander over to Cannon Beach however, but because the tide was coming in, we had to be creative with our route choice, and so crawled through a little sea cave. After an amazing afternoon at the beach, we hiked back up to the park, hopped in the truck and made a few more miles further south - stopping at a few antique stores along the way. We settled into another State Park just south of Cape Perpetua, where we hope to do some hiking and tide pooling over the next day or two.

Hiking to Haystacks

Secret Sea Cave Connector!

We have been really lucky with the weather here - yesterday and today are both in the high twenties. So far, my only complaint about the Oregon Coast is that is just might spoil everywhere else!